ARTH 740A: Survey of Islamic Art

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Reference Works

When you are learning about a new topic, sometimes you just need some basic background information. Reference works (encyclopedias, dictionaries, almanacs, atlases, etc.) provide facts and basic information about people, places, movements, events, particular pieces of art, or whatever it is you want to learn more about. Wikipedia is an example of a reference work.

Reference works usually aren't suitable for citing in your paper, but they can give you a good place to start when you need to know foundational information about your topic.

Islam and Islamic Art Reference Sources

Designed for readers with little or no knowledge of Islam, the Oxford Dictionary of Islam provides vividly-written, up-to-date, and authoritative entries. The Dictionary focuses primarily on the 19th and 20th centuries, providing a highly informative look at the religious, political, and social spheres of the modern Islamic world.

Comprehensive reference work offering entries on Islamic art and architecture ranging from the Middle East to Central and South Asia, Africa, and Europe and spans over a thousand years of history, with illustrations of sculpture, mosaic, painting, ceramics, architecture, metalwork and calligraphy.

General Reference Sources

Offers fully-indexed, cross-searchable dictionary, language reference, and subject reference works published by Oxford University Press, including Oxford Companions Series. Covers a wide range of fields and includes illustrations, maps, timelines, biographies, and links to authoritative websites.

Art Reference Sources

Formerly Grove Art Online, it includes the entire 34 volumes of The Dictionary of Art, with articles as well as links to images on gallery and museum web pages around the world. Includes biographies of artists and searchable images.

A comprehensive and definitive resource for artists’ biographies, published since 1911. The Benezit Dictionary of Artists includes 170,000 biographies as well as auction records, exhibition histories, and over 11,000 images of artists’ signatures and stamps of sale.